EUGENE -- Without the worry of observers' prying eyes behind its closed practice gate, Oregon is free to dream up just about anything it likes during spring football's 15 practices.

But unlike some of their Pac-12 counterparts, there is one thing the Ducks are not exploring: experimenting with a two-way player.

Not yet, anyway.

"We’ve done that in the past some places I’ve been, and here a little bit, but at this point of spring we’re still just full-speed install mode and it’s really hard to do," coach Mark Helfrich said Wednesday, after Oregon's second spring practice. It’s not certainly impossible by any stretch but that’s something we’ll talk about a little bit more as spring goes along."

The two-way star might be the edge of innovation in the conference, yet it's a return to the college game's olden roots -- where specialization was a foreign concept -- if still a much more common concept at the high-school level.

Michigan's Charles Woodson won a Heisman Trophy in 1997 as a corner and receiver, and Ohio State's Chris Gamble played each side in 2002. Jesuit High School's Owen Marecic updated the role in 2010 for Stanford as a linebacker and fullback.

But the idea's popularity took off last fall when UCLA freshman linebacker Myles Jack rushed six times for 120 yards and a touchdown against Arizona in his first game on offense of the season -- a performance that earned him Pac-12 offensive player of the week honors. He later scored four touchdowns against Washington.

"I know Shaq was a heck of a running back in high school, so we’ll see," Washington coach Chris Petersen told the Seattle Times on March 3. "But he’s a pretty good linebacker, too.”

Does Oregon have any candidates? "It depends," Helfrich said.

If there is a pool of candidates at Oregon for such a role, starting inside linebacker Rodney Hardrick isn't one of them. He rushed for 66 yards on a fake punt against UCLA last season, and though he smiled at the suggestion, he much prefers focusing on defense.

"I don’t think so, I like to hit people, I don’t want to get hit," Hardrick said. "I don’t want to run the ball and get tackled -- I want to do the hitting. I enjoy where I’m at, honestly."